Stranger Things
by Lost In Rotation
Summary: A chance encounter. A clandestine meeting. A bit of gossip. A leap of faith. Set after the end of Deathly Hallows, less the Epilogue
1. Chapter 1

The bank was busier than usual, and Ginny Weasley was in a hurry, which did not make a pleasant combination on this particular Friday afternoon. A group of wise cracking kids out shopping for their upcoming year at Hogwarts had thought it would be funny to release all the Aviatomobiles from their boxes in the store, which had effectively shut the store down for three hours while she and George ran frantically around the store freezing every single one in place and repackaging them in their boxes. Not only had the incident cost them precious hours of sales on one of their busiest days of the month, but it had put her behind on her inventorying, which was a guaranteed way to put her out of sorts. Now, to top it all off, she had to stand in line at Gringotts, which had her red headed temper boiling though her hair had since lost its natural color.

When someone was rude enough to bump into her back as they passed, accidental or not, it pushed her over the edge. She spun around, her cloak twirling with her movement, to spit at the offender, "Honestly! Did your mother raise you in the Forbidden Forest?"

She wished she had taken the time to think before she spoke, or to at least get a decent look at the said offender who turned out to be a very handsome gentleman indeed. Her mouth clamped shut immediately as she tried to think of the best way to apologize for her rudeness, but as she stood awkwardly and racked her brain, her brain turned to another avenue as it tried to make the connection of where she knew the man from.

His brain seemed on a similar mission and he cocked his head slightly to the side and rubbed his chin in thought. Sudden recognition flickered in his eyes and he sputtered out her name, "Weasley?!" If she didn't know any better she would have thought the word carried malice behind it.

"Yes, and you ar-" her stomach sank and it felt as if someone had punched her in the gut. "Malfoy." A nervous, soft laughter escaped her next as they continued to stand there in the middle of the crowded bank, the minutes to closing ticking by quickly. "My gods, I believe my legs have become immobilized by equal parts embarrassment and fear." She had a tendency to overshare when uncomfortable.

He continued to stare at her in bewilderment. "It is Ginny Weasley, right?"

For a moment she seriously considered feigning ignorance and making up a new identity on the spot, but the shock of encountering Draco Malfoy of all people blanked her mind to a clean slate of stupidity and nothingness. "Right," she breathed with another nervous laugh. Her hands flailed nervously at her sides, and she resolved to folding them across her chest to keep from reaching out and hitting a passerby or from, worse, reaching forward to see if he still had those muscular arms from Quidditch form. "Small world," she managed. "How the hell have you been?" She didn't care, honestly, but common etiquette made her inquire. After all, it wasn't as if she could make this situation more uncomfortable.

"I've stayed busy considering the world doesn't find itself under constant attack from You Know Who."

"Right, right. Well, I better go make this deposit before I open my mouth again and say something so embarrassing I will be forced to hex myself." Her mind wandered where it shouldn't, thinking that scruff suited him just fine. He certainly looked more mature than the last time she had seen him. Could it really have been five years ago already?

A smile – a true, honest smile – crossed his face and it surprised her. In the six years she had known him at Hogwarts, she couldn't remember seeing a smile once. Now he wore it as a common accessory to his daily presence.

"It was... interesting seeing you again."

"Indeed, it was," he replied with his own version of good bye. It was only after he has bid his ado and headed to the opposite row of tellers did it register that he hadn't made a single snide remark. Though it had been a brief encounter, how easy it could have been to comment that he didn't know Weasleys had enough money to even know what a bank was. She had half the mind to pinch herself, but she knew she wasn't dreaming though she did feel a bit under a cloud of haze. Draco. Malfoy.

It was a moment before she realized she had called the last word out aloud. Squeezing her eyes shut with a deep sigh, she turned around to face him once more as he turned back at the sound of his last name. "Do you want to grab drinks tonight?" the words tumbled from her mouth before she could snatch them up and shove them back in. She had not meant to call out his name, and she certainly hadn't meant to ask him out, but there it was. Racking her brain for a spell that could dissolve her into a puddle on the floor, she came up blank.

His response was equally surprising, "Wonder Boy wouldn't mind?"

His retort puzzled her until she realized he meant Harry Potter. With a snort of surprise, she tousled her dyed brunette hair as she gave her head a hasty shake. "Harry and I broke up ages ago. Wow, two years ago now, in fact. I cannot believe it has actually been that long." She caught the tangent early and forced herself back on track before the conversation completely derailed. "I have to say, I'm rather surprised you didn't read that in the tabloids. Rita Skeeter was far from the only _journalist_," she emphasized the word sarcastically, "to run the story... over and over... for about six months."

"Well, I try not to waste what free time I have reading trashy _journalism_, and surprisingly enough I haven't committed my life to keeping tabs on Golden Boy's affairs. I was hoping an acceptance of your invitation might irk him – you know, for old time's sake – but alas."

"Acceptance?" She had anticipated many a response from him, but an agreement was not one of them.

The slight smile he gave her then was more like the ones she remembered from school; part devilish, part sly, and all mischievous. It sent tingles through her. When he named a time and place, she simply nodded in silent surprise. As he turned in a swish of cloak and disappeared into the crowd of wizards, witches, and goblins, she couldn't help but watch his retreating form.

"Oh, Ginny," she whispered to herself under her breath. She uncrossed her arms and reached down to grasp the bag of coins in the pouch inside of her cloak, only partial surprised that he hadn't nicked it. "You are in over your head, dearie." She slapped her right cheek once to snap herself out of the mood. With activities planned for the evening now, she hardly had time to stand around inside the bank and wonder aimlessly.


	2. Chapter 2

He awaited her outside the pub when she arrived three minutes earlier than their scheduled time. She approached at a brisk walk, her boot heels clanking against the brick walkway. When she reached him she held one hand up with her index finger pointing to wait while her left hand went to clutch her aching side. She had forgotten how long Muggle transportation took and had not taken the additional time into account appropriately when she had calculated her leave time, thus making her target arrival time late for their meeting. The self-induced panic this realization caused then forced her to speed walk the majority of the way from the tube to the pub, and now she regretted it officially as her side threatened to erupt.

Dropping her right hand, she placed both hands on her sides and bent double at the waist as she gasped to catch her breath. An extremely awkward moment of silence passed as she leveled her breathing as best as she could. Straightening with a snap of her back, her shoulder length hair whipped around and fell in a messy nest in her face. An upward angled puff of breath did nothing but raise the hairs teasingly in front of her before they settled back before her eyes, obscuring her view of a very amused looking Malfoy. With both hands at the same time, she reached forward and swept her hair behind her ears, hoping at that moment to just minimize the embarrassment as best as possible. Stray strands of bangs fell back into her peripheral view, but she opted to deal with them as they lay by that point.

"So, shall we? I could use a stiff drink – or two or three at this point now – to wipe this entire reunion up until now." In return, he reached for the door and opened it. With a grand, exaggerated sweeping motion of his other hand, he motioned her inside.

She headed towards the bar, then thought better of it at the last minute and turned toward the tables lined against the outer perimeter of the room. She selected an obscure table in the back, away from the windows and the other patrons in the pub before she plopped herself down on a bar stool at a high top. Once she had managed her short legs and hoisted herself up onto the stool, she slapped her hands down on the table and leaned towards him. "I have to say, Malfoy, you are full of surprises today. For one, I never thought in a million years you would have agreed to join me. Hell, I never thought in a million years I would _ask_, and yet here I find myself. And at this pub, of all places, which I had never heard of before and had a hell of a time figuring out how to get to. How did you even know of it?"

"There was, shall we say, a brief time period in my life where I decided, against my better judgment of course, to immerse myself into the Muggle world in order to escape for the prying eyes of the wizarding community."

"Oh yes, well didn't we all there for a while."

"Some of us for different reasons than others."

This comment shut her up just in time for the arrival of their waitress, a petite blond. Ginny had to do a double take when she saw the waitress, her eyes immediately traveling to the woman's rack, which she would have bet half the contents of her personal vault at Gringotts had not come naturally. The woman's German styled get up tried to emphasize as much as possible that feature which the girl was obviously very proud to have acquired.

"Can I get you something from the bar?" the waitress asked in a voice as perky as her breasts. Her questions was focused on Draco naturally, and he answered with a drink Ginny didn't recognize. When the waitress turned her attention to Ginny, her Muggle pen poised over her pad of paper in anticipation, Ginny faltered. She had gone out to a few Muggle joints with Hermione, but none recently, and she couldn't name a single drink to save her life. Her eyes darted to Draco as the waitress continued to wait. He stared back at her. She knew he could tell she was silently asking for help with her order, but he chose to ignore her plea. Kicking it up a notch, Ginny locked her jaw and lowered her bottom lip as she raised her hands slightly off the table palms up and shrugged her shoulders for a fraction of a second.

After another awkward moment of silence, Ginny propped her right elbow against the table and turned to face the waitress, palm to her cheek, "How's about you just surprise me, dearie?" she asked with an abundance of sweetness to her tone. She even scrunched up her nose as an added measure.

"Get her an Irish Car Bomb," Draco told the waitress without taking his gaze off Ginny. With a scribble on her pad and a curt nod, the waitress headed off to the bar. Ginny turned her attention back to Draco just as he turned to watch the waitress's retreating form.

"_Irish Car Bomb_?" Ginny asked with a scoff. "But, wait, I can't. Come back to that. First-" the words came out in a tumble as she found herself naturally relaxing after a stress filled day, "did you see the knockers on that girl? Holy shit, man, my eyes almost bugged out!"

"Funny," he commented as he stared at her quizzically, "it usually takes people a few drinks before they start commenting on body parts so openly. Especially when commenting on their own sex."

"Yeah, well, color me impressed. I bet a pair of those would go a long way for me at the shop when those horny little Hogwarts boys make their trips to Diagon Alley. But, I don't work on commission, so I guess it doesn't matter either way."

With a shake of his head, he started to lean back before he realized they were seated on bar stools. In turn, he crossed his arms as he placed them on the table and leaned forward instead. "I have to admit, the Ginny Weasley I had stored in my memory from school was nothing like this."

"You mean the hair?" she joked, reaching up to catch a few strands and twirl them around her finger. "I guess we're both full of surprises then."

He opened his mouth to respond, but the return of the waitress cut him off as she deposited their beer steins on the table in front of them and asked if they needed anything else. Malfoy responded for both of them. With a smile directed at him, she turned and headed back to the bar.

Ginny took one look at her glass before she glanced back up. "There is something floating in my stein. I'm new to this Muggle drinking, but even I find that suspicious."

"That's the shot glass."

"Oh well, yes, of course. The shot glass. That explains it. I forgot a _car bomb_ wouldn't be complete without a shot glass." She had never traveled to a foreign country before – it was on her bucket list – but she found this similar to her expectations of what it would be like trying to get by in a country where she didn't understand the language. "Well, cheers then, mate!" She lifted her stein and clanked it to his just as he had time to raise it off the table himself. While he took a drink from his and set it down, she chugged one, then two, then three swallows before she plopped the drink back down on the table.

She meant to comment that her drink tasted like what remained after a car bomb. "This is weird right?" were the words that left her mouth instead. "Or am I completely mad?"

"You are completely mad, but it is weird nonetheless." His response made her smile, and she felt some of the nervous energy evaporate. She hadn't felt this antsy since she used to secretly crush on Harry when he visited her house or during her first years at school. It was strange to say the least.

"Well, go on then. What has the devilish Draco Malfoy been up to since the defeat of Voldemort?"

He flinched just the slightest at the mention of the name – a still rather common reaction even in this day and age – but he didn't stumble over the name like many people did when she spoke it without hesitation. "Not much, I dare say." He took another few sips of his drink before continuing, "I don't see much of my fellow Slytherin students for one reason or the other. My family either for that matter, though that was a much easier adjustment than the shift in my life style from suddenly finding myself without a friend to call on."

"Hence the Muggle pubs."

"Cheers to that," he said with fake enthusiasm. "It's funny, really, because my whole life I had been taught that Muggles were such impure and improper things, but that's where I found myself able to escape to after finding myself rather ostracized from the community. Queue the resulting identity crisis that followed."

"Well, you certainly seem to have landed on your feet just fine." She felt herself having a bit of an identity crisis herself at that very moment, unable to truly comprehend that she was having this conversation with the person seated across from her.

"I did. Eventually. Once I cut myself away from my family, it didn't take me long to realize that I needed to find a way to pay for my frequent visits to the Muggle pubs, so I kind of cornered myself into picking a career and reacclimating myself into the wizarding world. Thankfully by that point very few people still gave a shite about me and my role in the whole thing. It was a shock, really, to realize that the world didn't revolve around me like I thought it did," this comment earned him a chuckle from Ginny, which she immediately followed up with a drink from her mug. "Turns out, though, that that was what I really needed to get back to living my life instead of hiding away from it."

When he stopped, Ginny had half the mind to reach out and place her hand on top of his to urge him to continue, but luckily the smarter half of her brain won out for once. "So then you..." she urged him on.

He polished off the rest of his beer and put the stein back on the table with a clink. "Oh. I became a healer at St. Mungo's with Potions and Plant Poisoning. That part of the story is rather boring, so I usually just leave it out."

She laughed, and the smile remained on her lips.

"I don't know," he finished, "I guess I had to eventually turn my talents to good after everything that happened, or I would have just ended up like my father."

She couldn't remember what had become of Lucius, but she certainly wasn't going to ask now.

"So what of the Chosen One?" he asked to abruptly change the subject, a signal that he clearly thought that he had shared enough with the stranger he hadn't seen in five years and that he hadn't even liked when he had known her.

She finished the last of her drink and prepared herself for the story she had told writers, friends, and family members hundreds of times over, but just as she began, he stood. "Hold that thought," he told her, swiping both steins off the high top and heading to the bar for replacements. Watching his retreating form, she dropped her head to the table top as soon as he disappeared from sight. She had spent half the early evening debating whether to even show up to meet him, and now she wished she had chickened out. She had no bloody idea what was happening. He was _sharing_ his story with her. _Her_. And without his cloak enveloping his entire figure, she couldn't help noticing the self-exile he had placed on himself had done little to wear away his well-defined figure. If anything, he had gotten even more fit than she recalled, which didn't seem fair of the universe to throw at her now.

"Blimey," she squeaked in surprise when she heard the sound of glass hitting the table to signal his return. Her head snapped up and she only hoped she didn't have a lovely red spot on her forehead from the table. The sight of the glass he slid towards her puzzled her. It certainly wasn't another car car drink of sorts. It was a glass with a long, thin stem that opened into a wide cone. The liquid that sat inside the cone was pink, and a lime wedge sat perched on the rim of the glass. "The hell is this?" she asked as she reached for it, her fingers grazing his for the slightest of moments, before she slid it across the table in front of her.

"Cosmo Cubana. Looked to be a bit more your flavor."

Ginny glanced up from the glass to him. "It's _pink_."

"Cheers, mate," he repeated her earlier toast before starting on his second beer. "Now, come on. I shared my incredibly juicy and swashbuckling life story. It's time you buck up and return the favor, Weasley."

Her face cringed as she sipped her drink, but it was a marked improvement over her last drink. "I feel like I shouldn't have to share my story as mine was easily accessible on the front page of every major newsprint for far too long."

"Yes, but the story they depicted was of a devilish fiend who sought to marry the greatest hero of all time and then steal his riches away with his heart. From the look of you, I dare say they embellished some facts in the stories somewhere."

She baulked, leaning back before catching the edge of the table to right herself. "You said you hadn't read any of the tabloids."

He shrugged and sipped from his drink. "I didn't. I got that from the Daily Prophet."

With a scoff, she shook her head and sipped her drink. "I don't know what happened honestly. It was as if I just woke up one day and wondered what the bloody hell I was doing. Of course, I'm sure it was more of a progressive transition than that. I just came to realize what certain people had been telling me my entire life-"

"- that he's a complete git?"

"That my infatuation with Harry was a childhood crush. I mean, I loved him, sure. I mean, not sure. Of course. Of course I loved him. And not in a big brother way, that would have been weird. But I think I idolized him more than anything else. Being with Harry allowed me to be the best version of myself when I was a teenager. I mean, Gods, it was _exciting_. I have stories that Fred and George never could have dreamt of telling. And they weren't stupid pranks played in the hallways of a school – although a few were if you remember – but actions that affected things. Important moments in history that will be remembered by everyone forever.

"That was a feeling, a rush that was hard to let go of. But then Harry defeated Voldemort. And he was still the Boy Who Lived to the public eye. But in private, every day he became more and more just... Harry Potter. And then, one day, it's like it just dawned on me. But I hadn't just won the affection of regular Ministry of Magic employee Harry Potter. I had gotten the Boy Who Lived, and that made it kind of hard to leave him."

"Especially since he hadn't asked you to marry him yet, so you wouldn't get a cent of his limitless riches." The comment put her off. She flashed back to the snide mockings of a young Draco Malfoy, in Diagon Alley and at Hogwarts, of the poor and impoverished Weasley family. Then she realized he was only mocking the material of the articles he had read in the papers, and she simmered back down before causing a scene.

"He took it pretty well, considering how all those articles played it out in the news. Ron wasn't exactly ecstatic that we broke up, but he was definitely relieved he no longer had to worry about what his best friend and his sister were doing on a Saturday night.

"Course, he wasn't so excited when his own relationship ended less than a month later, for a lot of reasons, some of them the same, some of them very different. But at least they waited a respectable year before they finally got together."

"I take it you and the bushy hair are no longer the best of pals then?"

Ginny took another sip of her drink, and reached the sensation of her toes tingling. She hadn't afforded herself a night out in a while, and had forgotten how pleasant it felt as she slowly made the progression from sobriety to tipsiness. "On the contrary, still the best of. She's better suited for him anyway. After the adventures his faced as a teenager and all the hardship he knew growing up, Harry was ready to settle down at eighteen and that suited Hermione fine. But I was nineteen, and the last thing I wanted to do was settle down and start a family. So I guess in the end, it all worked out for the best. Except for Ron of course."

"So really, no hard feelings at all that the Golden Boy ended up with Bookworm?"

"Nope. I was the maid of honor at their wedding last month. I mean, I guess I was a little disappointed. Hermione had been seeing Viktor again, and I was kind of hoping that would work out. For selfish reasons, though. For one, I wanted to keep getting box seats at the Quidditch games, especially when Ron stopped playing. And then Hermione not only ended it with Viktor, but she started dating Harry. So now at the ripe age of 21, I've already lost my wingman. It's dreadful, really."

She polished off her drink twice as quickly as the first one. The tingling sensation from her toes had slowly spread, finding its way up her legs. It was starting to settle in her brain as well. His smirk made another appearance, and it made her smile. It was suddenly a good sight to see, so different from the one she remembered from Hogwarts. "And yourself? What have you been up to without your trusted wingman?"

The waitress stopped by the table, and Malfoy finished his beer in two final gulps. He slid both their glasses towards the waitress without a glance at her bodacious breasts and motioned for another round. Ginny glanced at the waitress and found herself smirking, as the waitress looked put out by the lack of attention from her companion.

"Well, when Hermione left Ron to date Quidditch players and saviors of the world, he didn't take it so well. He quit his job at Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes and took off to who knows where to work with Charlie. Now we see him maybe twice a year if we are lucky – or unfortunate depending on his mood when he visits. He did make an appearance for the wedding last month, but he was so angsty that it wasn't a very pleasant visit.

"And as for me, I got to take over his job at Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes since he left George high and dry and business has been booming – sometimes literally. I wanted to be a healer myself, actually, but life had other plans I guess."

"I forgot about you Weasleys and your sense of family."

The waitress dropped the two drinks at the table without a word and scurried away.

"Yes, us dreadful Weasleys." She took large sips of her drink this time, knowing she was flirting with danger but not caring. She hadn't gotten her buzz on in forever, and she was enjoying the floating feeling that was tinkling through her. It was _nice_ to feel like a young adult again instead of a grown up with too many responsibilities.

"I didn't mean it like that." His voice was calm, soft even.

"Of course not." They settled into an awkward silence as they nursed their new drinks.

She spent some time studying him over the rim of her drink. Only when he glanced up from his stein and met her gaze did she speak again, "Why did you agree to come tonight?"

"Why did you ask in the first place?" It irked her when people answered questions with other questions – something that George loved to do to her on a regular daily basis.

"I don't know," she answered honestly. "I was watching you walk away, and I thought to myself: Draco. Malfoy. Just like that, you know? Only, I guess I said your last name allowed, because you turned around and you were looking at me. And something in the way you looked at me – without that unfiltered hatred you used to have every time you even thought of my last name – I don't know. I got verbal diarrhea and the words just spilled out."

"Just like that, huh?"

"The full play by play, hand to God."

The bartender shouted last call as she reached the final few sips of her drink. With a glance at the clock above the bar, she was shocked to see it was almost 11:00. With a sudden yawn, she picked up her drink and finished it off with a smack of her lips as she set the empty glass down and slid it away. "I'd better get going. It takes a little longer to travel when you can't just apparate, and I have to open the shop for George tomorrow while he goes baby supply shopping with Luna."

"Luna? Luna _Lovegood_? Baby? _What_?"

Ginny gave him a coy smile, "That's a story for another day. And I'm sure you've read that in a paper as well."

"That one I actually have not seen. Though that definitely sounds like a story for the tabloids." She assumed he paid the tab, as he pulled a handful of bills she had only seen in her father's collection and placed the paper down on the table.

"Draco Malfoy carrying around Muggle money. I never thought I'd see the day. Honestly. It is like staring at you in a mirror and seeing my father." She stood and grabbed the edge of the table while she tried to get her land legs back. Her knees felt wobbly and her legs were a bit like gel.

He chose to ignore her quip and focused on the previous train of thought, "That is a love story I will have to hear next time."

She raised her eyebrow, though she doubted he could see it in the low lighting of the pub. "Next time?"

"You never know, Weasley. Stranger things could happen."

As they passed the waitress, she could feel the glare on the back of her neck. The hairs on her neck stood on end when she felt his hand at the small of her back. Just the slightest of touch as he guided her past the waitress and other slightly leering patrons towards the exit.

As she pushed the front doors open, she gasped in a deep breath of the damp, chilly night air. "Ahhh. I hate telling the sob story of my life, and yet I still had fun. This was _fun_." Raising her hands to the night sky, she spun once just for good measure.

"How about I walk you back to our part of town?" he offered, words she never thought she would hear from any Malfoy, especially directed at her.

"Nawh, that's okay. It's a beautiful night out and I don't mind the walk to the tube. It's really not _that_ far."

"It is a damp and dreary night out, and I'm not so much worried about the weather but more about your lowered inhibitions and the types of vagabonds that tend to linger about the tube at this time of evening when all the pubs are closing up shop. And your apparent inability to walk in a straight line."

He reached out and caught her arm to stable her as she teetered on her feet. She turned to face him, her hand catching his other arm as she tried to regain her balance. "Sorry," she sputtered with a giggle. "I haven't been out in a while and I think I might have had just a _little_ too much liquid fun."

"That being said, coupled with the fact that we are both heading to Diagon Alley anyway, has sold me on the decision of walking you." As so they went down the street towards the station, and if she had had more of her wits about her, it would have registered in her head that she was walking down the street, arm and arm, with Draco Malfoy, a fact that she would have called malarkey on if someone had told her a week ago she would be doing.


	3. Chapter 3

By the time they reached King Cross Rd., Ginny had sobered up enough to stand on her own. As they had gotten closer to the wizarding part of town, they both had slowly migrated away from one another. When they came within eyesight of the Leaky Cauldron, Ginny had her arms crossed against her chest and was matching Malfoy's pace, but a good few body widths separated them along the sidewalk. It was subconscious, really, but neither made a conscious move to decrease the amount of separation. Instead, as they moved slowly down the sidewalk, Ginny came to an abrupt halt. As Draco continued a few steps down, Ginny spoke to still him as well, "Well," she paused to clear her throat as he stopped and turned toward her, "this was – I dare to say – fun, Malfoy."

He looked down the road to the Cauldron and then back at her, which immediately made her flush in embarrassment. She couldn't be the only one in the pair that thought it would be far from ideal to stride into the Leaky Cauldron together close to midnight, when only the gossipers and drunks remained in the bar. No telling the things that might make their way into the tabloids then. Every once in a while, Ginny still saw small articles crop up with a picture of her sitting alone somewhere, usually in Diagon Alley during her lunch break, looking forlorn while the story played it out as if she was still pining away for Harry's return (for of course the story had become that Harry had dumped her in order to reunite with his one true love, Hermione Granger).

"Yes, I believe I did as well."

A hug felt appropriate for the situation but so completely inappropriate considering the pairing, so she settled with thrusting her hand out for a shake. He gave her a queer look for a moment; then his hand found hers and gave it a hearty, embellished shake. As their hands stilled, they held on for a moment longer, and Ginny felt herself impulsively leaning towards him just as he gave her hand the gentlest of squeezes. Then his hand pulled away and she straightened her posture and cleared her throat once more with a sniff of her nose, which was perilously close to running as the damp moisture of the evening hung overhead.

"It is such a nice night out," she said, trying to hold back as much sarcasm as she could now that the alcohol had less control of her brain and her mouth. "You go on ahead; I'll wait a few minutes before I head back." The extra few minutes would help her clear her thoughts, for she had quite a few inappropriate ones dancing through her mind at the moment that she should never entertain.

He hesitated for the briefest of moments and she longed to know what he wanted to say, if he was having the same, insane inklings that she was pondering recklessly. Then with a curt nod of his head for farewell, he departed.

"Draco," she halted him just as he started to leave. The compulsion was starting to feel routine. His first name felt so foreign when she spoke it aloud, but it was a pleasant sound as it rolled off her tongue. The look of him standing there, his face uncertain as he waited, made her heart pound unnaturally so. "I'm glad we got this opportunity. And that we didn't let old... rivalries ruin the evening."

"Good night, Weasley," was his only reply. He took off down the sidewalk, his hands in his pockets, his shoulders slightly slumped.

"Oh, dear," she let out when he was finally out of earshot. Sucking in a deep breath that made her light headed, she slowly let the shaky air out. Just the sight of his retreating back, which was well defined under his t-shirt with the lighting the street lamps afforded, made her want to follow after him. She chalked the feeling up to the amount of alcohol she had consumed and the length of time since her last relationship and she held firm, standing on the sidewalk long after he had vanished into the Leaky Cauldron until she finally had her wits gathered and her mind cleared of such irrational thoughts.


	4. Chapter 4

"You did _what_?" Hermione baulked, sputtering her water across her dinner plate in surprise. Ginny kicked her under the table just as Harry returned with the bottle of Muggle wine he had been searching for in their cellar.

"You promised you wouldn't freak out," Ginny reminded her friend. "I am already regretting telling you." She moved the food around on her plate but didn't take a bite. When she had told Hermione she wanted to catch up, she had meant she wanted to get together to dissect her night out with Malfoy the previous evening. Hermione had invited her to dinner, but neglected to tell her that Harry would be joining them for the evening. She fought the urge to escape from the house and never speak aloud of the reunion with their childhood nemesis again.

"When I made that promise, Ginny, I wasn't expecting _this_."

Harry removed the cork from the bottle of wine and began to pour a glass for each of them. He tried to look disinterested in the conversation, but Ginny had known him long enough to know he was paying close attention. Her gut dropped into her intestines. "Relax, Hermione. It's not like I slept with him. It's been a while since I went out drinking," she didn't add that she blamed that on Hermione, "but I still had some self-restraint. It was just drinks. All we did was talk."

"You talk about self-restraint like you actually _wanted_ to sleep with him."

"Well, you know," Ginny stumbled over forming a sentence. When that failed, she finished with a wave of her hand.

"Oh Ginny, really." Ginny hadn't seen that classic disapproving look since the days at Hogwarts when she used to tell Hermione she was going to go hang out down by the lake instead of study for exams. Oddly, it bothered her more now than it did back then.

Harry took this moment to sit down as he offered a wine glass to each of the women at the table.

"This is why I didn't want to tell you; you are being very judgmental, Hermione."

"Ginny. Really." Hermione's pointed look was hard to escape.

"He's a lot different than when you all… left Hogwarts. Was pleasant even."

"Who are we talking about?" Harry asked as he took a bite from his dinner and a sip of his wine.

"Dean Thomas," Hermione responded without missing a beat. She didn't even need to see the look Ginny was shooting her from across the table before she lied so effortlessly. "Ginny ran into him at Gringotts yesterday."

"My word, Dean Thomas. How is he these days? I haven't seen him since I can't even remember when."

Silence blanketed the trio until Hermione gave Ginny a quick nudge with her foot under the table. She realized quickly she should be the one to answer the question. "Good. He was good. He looked really good. Been keeping busy."

"What's he been up to?" Harry asked, suddenly far too interested in their conversation for Ginny's liking.

"Believe he mentioned he's working at St. Mungo's now," Ginny responded as vaguely as possible without arising suspicion.

"Really?" Hermione asked, showing interest herself.

Ginny nodded as she took a desperate gulp from her wine glass. She knew she should have faked an emergency as soon as she arrived and saw Harry reading the paper. The night was guaranteed to end in disaster if the conversation kept up as Hermione had picked an interesting enough name from their past that Harry wanted to stay included in the conversation.

"So when you say that he looked good…" Hermione trailed off, waiting for Ginny to pick up the thought.

"Good, Hermione. Really good. Like, even better than I remember. I had half the mind to invite him back for a nightcap on the spot."

"Oh, Ginny." Hermione gave a disapproving shake of her head.

"See, there we go with the judging again."

"I don't see what is so bad about Ginny wanting to date Dean again. I'm not even sure why you two broke up in the first place."

Ginny and Hermione both took the opportunity to shove a large amount of food into their mouths and chew slowly. "I broke up with him because of you, Harry. Honestly, boys can be so thick sometimes," she answered with an emptied mouth.

Harry and Hermione engaged a sideways glance at each other before Harry dug into his food. "Well, right then. I don't see what the problem is with them giving it another go at it now."

"And it's not like I did invite him back, Hermione. Give me a little bit of credit. Though I was totally sloshed for a while there. But really, he was a complete gentleman. It was… weird. But nice."

"I just don't think it's a good idea, that's all," Hermione huffed with a whiff of superiority. That token was clearly not all she had to say on the subject manner, but she at least let Ginny save face in front of Harry. They could only guess what his reaction would be if they found out the true topic of the dinner's discussion.

Ginny had finished her glass of wine too quickly, and the bubbles were making their way back into her brain. "Well, why not?" she blurted out as they ate. "And let me remind you, Hermione, that he looked _really_ amazing. And I haven't had a good shag in ages. Hell, I haven't had a bad shag in ages either. And it's not like I want to marry the bloke or anything absurd. Maybe just, you know, get to know him in the magical sense."

"Now I think I'm a bit uncomfortable with the route this conversation has taken," Harry chimed in to no avail.

"Ginny, you could do so much better than him."

"You don't even know him, Hermione. He's changed a lot since we left Hogwarts."

"You don't know him either, Ginny," Hermione pointed out. She directed her fork towards Ginny for emphasis. "And he can't have changed that much. You deserve better."

"Shouldn't we give him another chance though?"

"So meet him for coffee. Or lunch. In a public place. Without any alcohol." Hermione made a point to stress the last sentence.

Ginny rolled her eyes. At the mention of alcohol, she excused herself from the table to pour herself another glass of wine. "And what if I meet him on this day date," she asked as she sat back down and scooted her chair back to the table, "and he charms the pants off me – literally or metaphorically."

"Well, you've obviously made up your mind already, Ginevra, so I don't know why we're even having this conversation."

She could tell she made Hermione upset when Hermione resorted to her birth name. "I was hoping you would agree that it's worth giving him the benefit of the doubt. As the moral backbone of our little group, I honestly value your opinion, Hermione." Ginny finished off the remainder of her dinner, then caught her friend's glance from across the dining room table. "What if you had coffee with us? I think if you talked to him, you would see where I'm coming from. If you just saw him, I think you might reconsider."

"A double date, we haven't done one of those in a while," Harry commented as Ginny got up to pour herself a third glass of wine. When she saw the bottle was empty, she disappeared into the kitchen to grab a firewhisky before returning to her spot at the table.

"Oh, by no means are you invited, Harry." She finally responded when she returned.

Harry glanced at Hermione as if she would overrule, but with a shrug Hermione continued to eat.

"Look, do you really think it would be a good idea for you to tag along when I am trying to rekindle with the guy I broke up with in the first place because of you? It certainly wouldn't stack the odds in my favor."

"I think I don't understand why Hermione doesn't want you dating Dean Thomas in the first place." Harry admitted.

"She has her reasons," Ginny replied before Hermione could speak up for herself. "Anyway, I had better be off. Adult responsibilities in the morning and all that jazz for us lowly working class."

"I work," Harry protested, but Ginny and Hermione both responded with a laugh.

"It was a pleasure," Ginny thanked them as she polished off her drink. Her legs felt a little shaky beneath her, but she managed walking around the table to give Hermione a hug just fine. "Thank you for the advice. If you would be up to it, I think I was serious about that coffee meeting."

"I'll think about it," Hermione promised.

"Then I will mull it over when I sober up and get back to you," Ginny promised back with a flash of a wicked grin. "Thanks, love."

"See you at the family barbeque next week?" Harry asked as Hermione returned Ginny's hug. "You could just bring Dean along to that. I bet George would love to catch up with him."

She had almost forgotten the family barbeque. "I doubt he'll be available, but I'll ask," she lied. Hell would freeze over before Ginny Weasley ever took Draco Malfoy to a family outing. "Bye, dearie," she bid Harry with a wave. "And thanks again. The dinner was delish, and the wine was superb."


	5. Chapter 5

She knocked again, louder and longer this time, as she began to feel a bit on display standing in this hallway so late at night in a building she had never stepped foot in before. No one had passed through the hallway yet, but she could already feel the judgment if someone did. She wanted to be linked to this potentially horrible idea by the least number of people possible.

When the door finally opened, the face on the other end was not one she would classify as joyful. It was surprised, certainly, but not necessarily in a good manner. He looked startled, definitely. Even a bit upset, perhaps.

"Believe me," she confessed, "no one is more startled than I am to find myself standing here right now, but here we are." She extended her hands up in a flair of a 'ta-da!' motion to try to lighten the mood. She glanced down the long hallway, her brain counting the number of other apartment doors on his floor. Her head snapped back to face him, "Mind if I came in? Nosey neighbors, all that jazz."

He stood frozen in place before he finally seemed to snap out of it. "How did you find my place?" he asked when he responded. He made no move to let her into the apartment. Perhaps he thought he had a better chance of denial if someone saw her standing outside his door and he was firmly blocking the entryway.

"I am many things, Malfoy. Resourceful happens to be one of them."

"_Why_ are you here?" was his next question.

"Yes, well, try not to judge too harshly as I consumed a more than recommended amount of wine and firewhisky at Harry and Hermione's tonight, so I am not in tip top shape, mental wise. But I was telling Hermione about seeing you yesterday, and how weird it was, but also that it wasn't weird, you know? And as I told her about how you had changed, I couldn't help but wonder _why_ exactly."

"Why I turned my powers of evil towards good?" he asked, his face unreadable.

"No," she laughed off his comment with a wave of her hand, "I reckon I have a pretty good guess as to that reasoning. I wondered why, exactly, I didn't invite you back for a nightcap after drinks last night. And I couldn't really come up with a good reason. And Hermione couldn't really come up with a good opposition either. So, I don't know, I guess I'm here now to see if you are even interested."

"In a nightcap?" Even in her slightly intoxicated haze she could tell he was having a bit of difficultly following her. She wondered vaguely if he had been drinking at all this evening as well.

"Yes, a nightcap. Of course. I mean, that's what I said right?" she tossed her head back and laughed while she tried to make herself shut up before she completely embarrassed herself.

It took him a minute to respond. When he did, he leaned a bit towards her and squinted an eye. "Just how knackered are you right now?" he asked as he tried to deduce for himself.

She mulled it over for a bit, biting on her lower lip as she thought. "Enough for me to have the stones to come over here, but not enough to impair my ability to floo or walk in a – mostly – straight line." She looked at him, really studied him, and tried to find the similarities to the boy she knew growing up. He was such a different person now, though, and it hardened her resolve as she realized so. "I don't know, I just feel like I've been in a rut since I ended things with Harry, and I don't know what I've been waiting for, you know? My life is kind of a mess because of my own doing, but it doesn't have to be. I thought I would feel guilty or something for moving on, especially the way Harry acted tonight at dinner when Hermione and I were gossiping about Dean – it's a long story," she told him at his puzzled look at the mention of Dean's name, "but that's ridiculous because I was in _their_ house. I have the right to move on too."

"Seeing as how very little of what you are saying to me right now is making much sense, I am going to venture a guess that you have probably already had too much to drink tonight to warrant a nightcap. So I'm not quite sure why you are actually here, Weasley."

His inability to comprehend her infuriated her, but she tried to keep her temper at bay. "I'm here because I had _fun_ last night. I work in a joke shop, but I haven't had fun in ages. And I certainly didn't expect to have fun with you of all people – no offense – but I did. And I feel like it would be a mistake if I let old prejudices dictate my decisions. You've changed since Hogwarts and I've changed since Hogwarts. We grew up, you know?"

"Some of us perhaps more than others," he commented. She rolled her eyes in response. She hadn't been drunk in ages, and he just happened to be catching her in two consecutive bad nights. So hex her. "Are you propositioning me for something here, Weasley, or has this train completely derailed? I have a very comfortable couch if you need to sleep off a bender."

"Not drunk, I promise," she told him, though she only half believed it herself. "Just," she struggled to find a word that fit, "expressive for the first time in a long while. You gave up your family manor, Malfoy. You left your bad days behind you, and you escaped from the world that sucked you in. I envy you for that. I admire you for that. And you just… you looked _so_ good last night – and you look even better now without even trying." She had never seen his hair without its slicked back look, but he stood before her now with messy, disheveled hair that suited him just fine. "I guess why I came here tonight was to see if it still mattered to you that I'm a Weasley."

"You certainly don't look like a Weasley anymore," he commented as he glanced her up and down. His posture relaxed against the door as he shifted a little further into the hallway toward her.

She laughed at the comment, "Something that irritates my mother to no end, I assure you. Her first comment when I show up at the barbeque will be, 'Oh, Ginny, sweetie, has that charm still not worn off?'" Even in her drunken state, Ginny managed a rather impressive Molly impersonation.

"You look good as a brunette, Weasley, I must say. And if it had mattered to me still, I wouldn't have met you at that Muggle pub last night. I wouldn't even have talked to you at the bank. I don't regret everything I did as a teenager, but I do regret a lot of it. Harry and Ron deserved most of it though, and even that know-it-all Hermione needed to be knocked down a peg every once in a while."

"They still do, trust me," she laughed. "But honestly, it has been a long night, Malfoy, and my legs are about done protesting my verticalness and about to buckle. So if you could just go ahead and let me know which way you are leaning on that nightcap, well that would be swell. That couch you mentioned is starting to look nice too. I bet your bed is even more comfortable."

He stared at her, dumbstruck, for a pause until he collected his wits. "Merlin's bread, Weasley, you really aren't that Potter-struck, puppy eyed little girl anymore are you?"

"If there is one thing that I learned from my participation in the Second Wizarding War, it's that you never know what tomorrow will bring, and you can't spend your life waiting for things to happen or you will find yourself out of time." Unzipping her jacket, she slid it from her shoulders and folded it across her arm. Someone had cast a powerful heating spell in the hallway, and she couldn't handle the extra layer a moment longer. "So how about it?"

His jaw clenched as he swallowed. She watched intently as his Adam's apple bobbed from the action. She bit her lip as she waited, her anxiety mixing with the alcohol in her stomach. Then, as if in slow motion, he took a step back into the apartment. Without a word, he pulled the door open and motioned her in. "Perfect!" she replied in a cheerful voice as she stepped inside, brushing against him though he had left more than enough room. "But just to clarify," she told him as he extended his hand for her jacket and she handed it over, "I wasn't implying I would sleep with you. You can take the couch."

His jaw practically dropped from her audacity, and she left him utterly speechless.

"At least for tonight," she told him as she extended her leg to kick his front door shut.

_If you enjoyed reading Stranger Things you can continue the story with, When Hell Freezes Over, at s/10877631/1/When-Hell-Freezes-Over. Thank you all for reading and reviewing._


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